James K. Randall (June 16, 1929 - Cleveland, Ohio ; May 28, 2014 - Princeton, New Jersey) was an American composer, music theorist, and early adopter of electronic music. At the time of his death he was Professor of Music Emeritus at Princeton University.[1][2]
Life and careeredit
James Kirtland Randall was born in Cleveland, Ohio to Margaret ("Miggie") Wright Randall and Edwin Templeton Randall. Miggie Randall was a violin teacher at the Cleveland Institute of Music and brought young James up as a music prodigy, with the ambition that he would become a famous piano player. When James was 17, a piano sonata that he composed was played at Carnegie Hall by his teacher, Leonard Shure.[3]
At Princeton, he became a pioneer in electronic music, working from the very early days of punch cards. Music from that time includes Lyric Variations for Violin and Computer, Quartets in Pairs, and Quartersines.
Later, he did a great deal of free-wheeling improvisation, then late in life came back to composing for piano (the GAP series) and MIDI (a garland of Midi, My Prayer for Bella).
Though Randall's music was mostly heard within the small world of academic music, it occasionally reached a wider audience, for instance on the radio show "Schickele Mix" Archived 2009-12-08 at the Wayback Machine:[4]
He also wrote about music, published at first in Perspectives of New Music. Many of his writings took the form of highly experimental prose poems. A typical footnote from Compose Yourself -- A Manual for the Young (1972) reads:[2]
1.) (pfung! ; !pfung(
The publication of Compose Yourself caused a major financial backer to remove his support from Perspectives of New Music.[5] While J.K. Randall's early works were set in conventional type, in his later writings he often used his own calligraphy.[6]
Randall's writings are collected in the 2-volume set Being About Music (with Benjamin Boretz). Much of J.K. Randall's work is published by Open Space and a large collection of his manuscripts and papers is held in the J. K. Randall Collection of the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts.[7]
J.K. Randall was married to Ruth Hochheimer Randall for 62 years. They had 3 children together; Ellen, Thomas, and Beth.
Compositionsedit
Piano Sonata, 1944
Suite for Piano, 1946
Theme and Variations, 1947
Variations for Cello and Piano, 1949
Rodeo for Solo Violin, 1953
Woodwind Quintet in Three Movements, 1953
Dance for Woodwind Quintet, 1953
Quartet, 1953
Music for Brass Sextet, 1953
Old Song, 1954
String Trio, 1954
To You, 1954
Choral Pieces, 1955
Five Monologues for Cello, 1955
Violin Sonata, 1955
Violin and Viola, 1955
Slow Movement, 1959
Improvisation on a poem by e. e. cummings, 1961, rev. 1974
INTER/PLAY [tapes of improvised performances], 1980 - 1990
Three for Piano, 1991
Gap 1, 1991
Gap 2, 1993
Gap 3, 1994
Gap 4, 1994
Gap 5 (in memoriam Leonard Shure), 1994
The Fish, 1995
Svejk, 1996
Nine Salon Pieces for Yamaha DX-100, 1996
Troubadour Songs, 1997
Intimacy -- a Polemic, 1998
Gap 6, 1999
BAB-0, 2001
A Garland of C-Sound, 2001
GAP 8, 2002
Shouldn't we Talk?, 2003
Intermezzo in MIDI, 2003
GAP 7, 2004
Contrapunctus XI.2, 2004
Boogiebop and Cartoon, 2004
Notebook A, 2004
A Benfest, 2004
Ars Antiqua, 2005
A Garland of MIDI, 2005
Through Lapland, 2009
Grow, 2010
My Prayer for Bella, 2012
The Way it Was, 2013
Writingsedit
Haydn: String Quartet in D major, op. 76, no. 5, Music Review, 1960
Pitch-Time Correlations, written 1962
Godfrey Winham: Composition for Orchestra, Perspectives of New Music, 1963–64
Convertible Counterpoint in the Strict Style (1906) by Serge Ivanovitch Tanaiev JMT, 1964
Three Lectures to Scientists, Perspectives of New Music, 1967
Compose Yourself -- A Manual for the Young, Perspectives of New Music, 1971 - 1974
A Soundscroll, Perspectives of New Music, 1975
How Music Goes, Perspectives of New Music, 1976
ADVT. --> repeat after me, Perspectives of New Music, 1979–80
Are You Serious?, Perspectives of New Music, 1985
)something medieval), Lingua Press, 1988
Ten Thoughts about Lyric Variations, 1993
It's all Yours/ A Note on GAP 6, Open Space Magazine 3, 2001
On Facing Front, Open Space Magazine 5, 2003
What is it About ABOUT?, Open Space Magazine 5, 2003
Being About Music, 2 vols. Collected writings of J.K. Randall and Ben Boretz, 2003
Liner Notes to "Shouldn't we Talk?", 2003
When the Birds Come Calling (A Public Meditation on Two Recent Compositions by Ben Boretz), Open Space Magazine 8/9, Special Supplement, 2006 - 07.
To Astonish the Roses, Open Space, 2013.
Referencesedit
^Saxon, Jamie (5 Jun 2014). "James Randall, Princeton music professor and pioneer in electronic music, dies". Princeton University.
^ abRahn, John (2001)
. "Aspects of Musical Explanation ", pp. 55–58 in Benjamin Boretz (ed.). Music Inside Out: Going Too Far in Musical Essays. Psychology Press
^Town Topics (4 June 2014). "Obituary:James K. Randall"
^Selleck, John (March–April 1977) "An Insider's Guide to Computer Music Recordings", pp. 71–72. Creative Computing
Further readingedit
Mackey, Steven (18 June 2014). "Jim (J.K.) Randall (1929-2014)—Out of View of Anything Resembling the Mainstream". New Music Box
Rahn, John (1992). "Another Lecture: Notes on Another Lecture and J. K. Randall", pp. 238 –248. Perspectives of New Music, Vol. 30, No. 1 (subscription required)
Swift, Richard (1964). "The Demonstrations of J. K. Randall", pp. 77–86. Perspectives of New Music, Vol. 2, No. 2 (subscription required)
Chippewa, Jef (2005). "Being About Music: Tracing the American Post-War Musical Consciousness"
Gleason, Scott (2013). "Princeton Theory's Problematics"
tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE (2013). Review of J.K. Randall's To Astonish the Roses
External linksedit
J. K. Randall Discography at Discogs
Princeton University Memorial Blog
J. K. Randall's YouTube Channel
Composers and Computers: Episode 02: Composers in the Computer Center
J. K. Randall on videoedit
Interview with J. K. Randall (New York Public Library)
JKR memorial on vimeo
Milton Babbitt: Portrait of a Serial Composer (contains footage of J. K. Randall)